1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to inspecting manufactured parts for defects or undesirable qualities. More particularly, the present invention relates to mechanically moving a part past a camera for automated inspection of the part. Specifically, the present invention relates to clamping a part to be inspected between a first portion and a second portion of a clamp and thereafter moving the part via the clamp past a line scan camera to inspect the part.
2. Background Information
Common everyday parts such as off-the-shelf screws, bolts, and other fasteners are relatively inexpensive and easily located. These off-the-shelf parts are purposely relatively low quality as these parts are used in home improvement projects, woodworking, or other common activities where quality isn't a major concern. Conversely, when these parts such as custom made screws or bolts are used in mission critical systems such as in the aerospace field, every part needs to be exact and pass rigorous testing and inspection. Failure of the mission critical part due to a flaw in the material or shape may be catastrophic. Often these mission critical parts are made in a low production run of a specific size part to fit a specific need. Inasmuch as the size and shape of these mission critical parts are always changing to fit the production run, inspecting each part is primarily done one part at a time by manually reviewing the part with the naked eye or a microscope. This is very time consuming and expensive, increasing the cost of each part to the end purchaser. Thus, there exists a tremendous need in the art to automate the scanning of mission critical parts and provide an apparatus and method for automatically inspecting parts in bulk.